Zellweger, Paul. xe2x80x9cWeb-based Sales: Defining the Cognitive Buyer.xe2x80x9d International Journal of Electronic Markets. Vol. 7 No. 3, 1997. pp. 16-22.
Zellweger, Paul. The Knowledge Tree. unpublished paper, Jan. 3, 1998.
The content menu and its underlying open hierarchical data structure provides an extremely effective way to organize a collection of information and make it available to end-users. A major benefit of this approach is that information can be stored and looked up using equivalent menu topics (Zellweger U.S. Pat. No. 5,630,125), something prior binary menu structures simply cannot do.
Using the open hierarchical data structure to organize information on a network like the World Wide Web makes perfect sense. The environment is rich with detailed information and its users are drawn to its self-service orientation. Zellweger (Ser. No. 09/080,102) now U.S. Pat. No. 6,301,583, discloses how to create a hypertext-based content menu that is optimized for traffic on the Web. In another disclosure, Zellweger (Ser. No. 09/080,100) now U.S. Pat. No. 6,243,700, teaches bow to use an open hierarchical data structure to generate menu data for a Java-based content menu that is optimized for client server communication on the Web. Yet neither one of these disclosures shows how to accept topics and links from content providers on the Web in a self-service fashion.
More recently, Zellweger (No. 60/095,808) discloses how to generate a self-service system that enables individual content providers on a network to add topics and links to a content menu that serves as central directory assistance on the Web. The system employs a highly structured menu-based approach that does not allow individual contributors to introduce new menu paths or change an existing one. The disclosure limits changes to adding topics and links to an existing structure. In contrast, the present invention overcomes this restriction by enabling contributors to build and change menu paths in the underlying menu structure, thereby broadening its self-service appeal to users.
In the present invention a content provider navigates the Web using a commercially available browser. When relevant information is located software associated with the present invention is invoked, enabling the end-user to create and change paths in an existing content menu and link the browser""s current location to the menu""s underlying structure.
The present invention is a general purpose self-service system that enables knowledge workers, nontechnical professionals, and even hobbyists to organize information on a network. In a corporate setting the invention can be used on a home page to link to information on servers throughout the Intranet. Individual content providers build and maintain the directory system, in a self service fashion, by adding links to their content on different servers. On a smaller scale, an individual can use the invention to organize personal information such as bookmarks or email addresses. In any case, the present invention removes the prior technical demands associated with building and maintaining a content menu by limiting the number of functions and by introducing a simple topic string command to create a new menu path.
The present invention improves the prior art of the content menu by disclosing a self-service component that enables end-users to make changes to a menu structure and link their online network content to it. End-users employ commercially available browsers like Netscape Navigator to navigate hyperlinks in a network like the World Wide Web to locate a relevant information object. When software associated with the present invention is invoked from the browser a configuration user interface is displayed. The configuration user interface accepts a predefined notation that enables a contributor to supply a topic string command to create a new menu path in an existing content menu. The interface also includes an interactive content menu and the controls to add and change its menu topics. The end-user contributor uses the present invention to designate a path or create a new one, by the command sting or by the content menu, and link the network address or Universal Resource Locator (URL) of the information object to it.